Times Now – Newshour

When Arnab Goswami made Abhijeet Mukherjee rue the day he learnt to speak.

Theatre actor, TV content writer and quizmaster, Ambesh is a recipient of the Young India Fellowship and has hosted more then 60 quizzes in over 20 cities across India. He's even been honored by the Governor of Madhya Pradesh for promoting the culture of quizzing in MP. We say ise lock kiya jaye.

A voice saying “The storm is coming”, fireworks all around, one man in charge, chaos all over and yet one voice can be heard rising towards the end. Hold it right there before your imagination runs away with you, I’m not speaking of a Nolan Brothers movie but of our very own Dark Knight. Who rises not once, but every night.

I speak of none other than our very own Mr Arnab Goswami.

In what I would easily describe as one of the best Newshour broadcasts ever, Arnab put a whole panel of guests through the third-degree like never before. So, what’s new in this? That for once, he seemed utterly justified in doing so.

The Newshour was on Abhijit Mukherhjee’s reference to the Delhi protesters as “dented and painted” women. The panelists were Rahul Easwar – Social Activist, Rahul Narvekar -Sr Advocate & Spokesperson, Shiv Sena, Vani Tripathi – National Secretary, BJP, Vrinda Grover – Human Rights Lawyer & Activist, Roshan Abbas – Filmmaker, Umang Sabharwal – Organiser, Slutwalk, Arpita Ghosh – Theatre Artist and the star of the moment – Abhijeet Mukherjee, Congress MP. The show began with Roshan Abbas taking on Abhijeet Mukherjee. But what happened next was what the government can describe as the “rarest of the rare cases”. The President’s son was interrogated in a manner only his dad would have interrogated him.

Arnab stepped into the ring soon enough and asked – “I want you to admit tonight. Will you or will you not admit?”. Mr Mukherjee, learning that it is better to not speak one’s mind, repeated one sentence from the beginning till the end – “I have withdrawn my statement”. After hearing Mukherjee repeat himself a few times too many, Arnab decided to turn his ire towards Rahul Narvekar of the Shiv Sena and asked him to speak on politicians. And then – asked him not to bring politics into the discussion!

And just when Abhijieet Mukherjee thought the attention was off of him, Arnab was back. With ill-disguised contempt he reprimanded Mukherjee much like a parent would have. Arnab decided that the nation would pass judgment on Mukherjee and told him he was “immature and unaware of how to conduct himself in public life”.

The topic of the Newshour debate was “What is dented and painted?” The other panellists, while seeming as outraged by Mukherjee’s comments as Arnab was, were left perplexed by Arnab’s ever-changing questions. At one point, Arpita Ghosh tried to make a point valiantly but Arnab decided to focus on Mamata Banerjee instead. Roshan Abbas did make a few valid points only to get interrupted repeatedly.

And then, just when you felt that Mukherjee might burst into tears from repeating the same sentence repeatedly and the debate was getting derailed, Arnab stated the impossible. Something which was even more amazing than one of our politicians making sense. He said, “I am calm and may I speak in between sometimes?!?” Really Arnab, after all these years, dozens of debates, 224354 tweets on your hosting style – who would have thought that you would ask for permission to speak on your own show? The shock of this statement got the discussion right back on track.

In my opinion, the debate was great and some brilliant points were made. And at least Arnab put Abhijeet Mukherjee on the spot. If only Arnab himself wouldn’t digress during his debates. And allow his panellists to speak at least one sentence without interjecting? Till such time, if not propriety, at least the fear of facing Arnab’s anger should make Abhijeet Mukherjee and other politicians think before they speak.

Wish to see Arnab do that to Owaisi brothers sometime. Am I asking too much? perhaps…

http://twitter.com/bpatnaik143 Bhaskar

We are a pretencious nation my frnd our definition for secularism is letting muslims getaway with anything they want to say. What Varun Gandhi said was wrong and so are the Owaisi brothers..

Rachit

That interview is totally funny.

Nagi

Can Arnab get Sonia or Rahul on the show and ask the same questions?

http://www.facebook.com/sanjayjoshi01 Sanjay Joshi

Abhijit Mukherjee is an idiot. And I have already withdrawn that statement.

Himani

A very good observation on an excellent debate….loved seeing the dark age thoughts of Mr.Mukherjee questioned

Lawyer

Rahul Narvekar is NOT a senior advocate, and probably never will be. He is a junior lawyer. Please don’t reprint the typo in Newshour.

som

Remember this incident about Arnab from Caravan?

“When Hector Kenneth, who manages the channel’s desk now, called a female anchor a “cunt”—according to several witnesses—Crasta encouraged the anchor to lodge an official complaint. That very day, Goswami announced loudly, “Every employee should strive to be like Hector.” “

Smita

Honestly speaking, the show had the exact opposite of the intended effect on me. Instead of feeling outraged at Mr Mukherjee, I felt pretty sorry for him. It is easy to take on small fry. Lets see Arnab spew his fire and brimstone on the Owaisi brothers, on Vadra and the big Gs, on MMS, on any NAC member……grill them on more substantial issues than on some idiotic phrase by a forgettable wannabe.

http://www.facebook.com/ammu.balachandran Ammu Balachandran

Where are those angry, hate filled goons you see on live news, ranting and raving about the latest cause celebre? When undereducated people being passed off by the various political parties as politicians, make comments like this, why dont crowds of people get together and beat them up? Why does a cartoon engender such hate filled reaction from the people that practice one religion; the same religious fanatics, commit murder, genocide and speak out against our religion and our people keep quiet? Why do we waste so much air time on pointless discussion about the under age rapist…let him get past the justice system and then, hopefully our feral goons will sodomize him with a iron rod wrapped in barbed wire or better hand him over the Delhi college students who ragged the architecture student so he can never walk again. They should be made to mete out justice to the more desrving of our people rather than fellow students.
M

manu

IF RG ever came on Arnab’s show, he would make mince-meat of the clown prince.

mohit mahajan, jammu.

arnab goswami : with ur unimitable, aggressive, hostile, arrogant, i’ll keep on interrupting, i’ll not listen to u, i’ll not get convinced – style, the news hour has become too loud and messy with ur continuous poking & meddling in between the discussions. agreed u r blunt and thorough in ur subject , but give some space to panelists. ur discussions end abruptly in a confusion. hope u get mature and learn the tricks of a panel discussion as to how to grill the without inflicting burn injuries.

Yuvraj

abbe chutiye.. is this really what you think or are u paid to write this?